Further Reading

Nevertheless, in its latest quarterly earnings report published on Tuesday, Comcast reported that it made $1.9 billion in profits in the first quarter of 2014—an 18 percent increase year-over-year.

“Our operating momentum is continuing as we enter 2014 and is highlighted by our second consecutive quarter of video customer growth, as well as strength in high-speed Internet and business services,” Comcast CEO Brian L. Roberts said in a statement.

The cable giant also noted that it had added 383,000 new Internet customers during the three-month period, leading to a “revenue growth of 9 percent,” which it described as being its “strongest rate of growth in two years.”

In a conference call with reporters earlier this month, Executive VP David Cohen said that Sony, DirecTV, and others continue to pose a threat to Comcast.

"The difference between all of those competitors and us is they all have national or global market scale, and with that scale comes marketing advantages in the way they can sell their products on a national basis, but it also brings scale to make investments, to make investments in R&D, in innovation, and in infrastructure and technology," Cohen said.

In the company’s annual report, which was filed in February 2014, Comcast reported 136,000 employees and annual 2013 profits of more than $6.8 billion. Between 2009 and 2013, Comcast recorded total profits of more than $24 billion.

Cyrus Farivar
Cyrus is a Senior Tech Policy Reporter at Ars Technica, and is also a radio producer and author. His latest book, Habeas Data, about the legal cases over the last 50 years that have had an outsized impact on surveillance and privacy law in America, is due out in May 2018 from Melville House. He is based in Oakland, California. Emailcyrus.farivar@arstechnica.com//Twitter@cfarivar